Prompt: Promise
by Ngoc Chau
Summary: Kurotsuchi Nemu loves this horribly frightening, remorseless, sadistic man because he keeps his promises to her. Every promise: to teach, to help, to hurt, to protect… he keeps it without a moment's hesitation. Mayuri x Nemu


**Ngoc Chau does not own Bleach**

**Okay, what's so different about this oneshot than my other oneshots is that it's written in present tense. Why? Because it's not really telling a plot line. It's discussing thoughts. So, the fanfics that really have no plot(expect for PWP, well maybe some PWPs and Lemons) and center more around circumstances, emotions, musings, and thoughts will be written in present tense(oh, and flashbacks!). **  
**Oneshots or fics that have some plot will be written in past tense because most people like to read it that way and it's easier to write with a plot. **  
**Or actually, I don't know! This prompt just seemed more suited for present tense than past tense. **

**Please read and review. **

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**Prompt: Promise**

Kurotsuchi Mayuri is a man of promises.

Nemu knows it and believes it with all her heart and would even be willing to lay down her life to vouce that fact. She allows herself to be utterly used by that man only because she believes him and everything he says. When he swears to her that if she should begin to slack off, he would punish her, he carries through with it to show her that he is serious and he is, never bluffing, indeed, a man of his word.  
Almost everyone who's part of the Gotei 13 knows about his punishments to her: beatings when he has to expel all that stress and frustration in an instant, tearing her asunder when she even dares to disagree with him, torture if he is especially cruel that day…

Pain is what he delivers when he promises it.

She is always in pain with him: in love, she is in pain and at his mercy; without him, she is in pain and aimless. It perplexes more us and them than her that she would feel this way for this man: her Captain, her parent, her creator…

The titles for him are endless, he is her everything: he is her brother, her second self, her father and her mother, her God… He is her life. And Nemu willingly allows herself to be his, follows him as closely as possibly even into Hell.

Obedience is one thing, trust is another. What he wants more than obedience itself for it can come after, is for her to lay her trust in him and his abilities. Mayuri doesn't want anyone, especially her of all people, to ever doubt what he can do; he never wants to hear or see them doubt that he can and will someday surpass Urahara Kisuke.  
She had made the mistake that day when he fought with the Quincy ryoka; she had asked him for medicine, had said her lungs were damaged and would surely stop functioning to him outloud in front of an enemy. As soon as the words had left her mouth, she had realized her mistake, that instant of betrayal and insolence from her in his eyes, and he had to stomp her faith in him back - literally. He had been insulted that she would ever think that he would've created her to be as fragile as humans, that he wouldn't have had the common sense to make her stronger than the rest.

His pride and his integrity are one and the same. It's not enough, she knows, for her to promise him that she will never betray him because he's heard other promises before and had them broken before him. And so to save himself from that, he's the one that makes the promises he knows that he can keep, that he will keep no matter what even if he must spill the blood of another or destroy a mind, even himself.  
The consistency makes him insane in their eyes, that they pity the woman and fear the scientist. But Reader, Nemu trusts Mayuri more than she would even trust anybody else. She would accept poison in his palms rather than water in chalices from the others. Truthfully, their words to her are only for the moment, forgotten when it becomes inconvenient for them or when they do not bother to even hold onto it any longer.

His promises are like grudges and vice versa: never forgotten, carried until the end of his life(for he is a very angry man. Don't you agree, Reader?).

Others promise and had promised her that they would never let him hurt her, that they would always protect her. Their promises are broken in two like dry sticks over his knee, crushed to dust in his grip. And then the bruises blooms like violet and golden flowers and later slowly disappears from that pale skin.  
She is more hurt when her expectations fall and are crushed than when he crushes her himself. It is more cruel, she proposes to herself, to be lied to than to actually know. The truth will always hurt, the lies will always break and batter.

When he promises her that he will see to it that she will never forget her mistake, will never make it again; he does whatever he must, even if it hurts her. And he is true to his word and she thanks him afterwards; thanks him for the new modifications, the new wounds, and the scars that fade away because he wants to try and make her look perfect. She thanks him for his help and time, just to make her stronger and better, to protect him and herself more efficiently. He smiles his wicked frightening smile and, alone, she knows that smile is his way of telling her, "No matter what, I will always help you."

When he promises that he will come back - to Soul Society, to Seireitei, to their labs, to her, he doesn't specify to what exactly - she can only nod her head to show that she will expect, never having to hope, seeing him soon.

Even in the face of certain death, when he tells her to be his shield; he promises her that she will not die. Anyone will tell her she is crazy, but she nods and obeys, becomes his puppet and allows the blade to divide her guts. And he always resurrects her without fail.

Because of this, she loves him. Kurotsuchi Nemu loves this horribly frightening, remorseless, sadistic man because he keeps his promises to her.

Every promise: to raise, to teach, to develop, to help, to hurt, to protect… he keeps it without a moment's hesitation or delay.

Reader, I will tell you a secret.

A promise that he will deny every having made will be this: he promises that as long as he should live and breathe(and that she continues to be useful, but let's leave that out, Reader, for the sake of the moment), she will always be by his side.  
As much as it's sometimes hard to stomach and trust, she believes this promise most of all.

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**This really didn't turn out as well as I thought. I had this idea for a while that surely everybody would know about how mean Mayuri can be to Nemu and surely someone had tried to protect her but failed to do so, therefore making a promise they couldn't keep. Wheras I noticed that whenever Mayuri is about to kill someone or goes out to do research, he completes it as he said he would. So this made me think about promises. Sorry if this seems a bit OOC, I tried.**

**If anyone knows any good MayurixNemu fics that aren't found when the search engine is filtered, please send me the link to it, if you can. **


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